below the dead the living
by more-than-words
Summary: Elizabeth comes home from Iran. Missing scenes for Tamerlane (1x16).
1. Chapter 1

Hey, fellow MSec fans! I'm still supposed to be writing prompt fics, but somehow this fic happened instead.

I never noticed before that at the end of the season one episode in Iran (still not over it) when Elizabeth is in the car on her way home, you can see hanging bodies reflected in the car window. Can't believe it took me like eighteen months to notice; clearly I'd be a terrible spy. Anyway, that inspired this, which was supposed to be a couple of thousand words of hurt/comfort and hugs but which has somehow grown into several chapters, because brevity is not one of my strong points.

Also there are a lot of missing scenes towards the end of that episode that I would've loved to see, so here they are in fanfic form instead. Enjoy!

P.S. I have to say thanks to thepuppiesinpink for reading through a draft of this and providing me with some much-needed reassurance :)

 **Chapter One**

The car made its way through the streets of Tehran, at first making good time as they left the secure bunker before becoming snarled up in traffic on one of the main roads out of the city, thousands of the city's residents obviously having had the same idea that now might be the time to flee.

Elizabeth sat in the back seat of the black SUV, feeling strangely detached from herself thanks to the combination of the shock of what had happened and the drugs that had been pumped into her system by an Iranian medical officer, and tried to force her mind to focus on the present.

It was almost over. That was what she told herself as she prepared to leave behind a country in turmoil and a family – more than one family – without a father.

She looked at the empty space to the left of her where Fred should be sitting but wasn't, and felt the pressure of tears building behind her eyes. She looked away, out of the window, hoping for a distraction.

Hanging bodies lined the streets.

 _God._

There were so many of them, strung up on display like an exhibit or a warning, or macabre flags lining the route of a bizarre victory march. Elizabeth couldn't look away from them, could feel her stomach lurching in horror as the car crawled along the road towards safety, the location of which she didn't know. She wanted to look away from the hanging people. Couldn't. It would be a disservice to her friend Javani and his family to look away. She already knew she'd never be able to forget the sight, that it would haunt her at night in the dark as would the terrorised face of little Abdol as he watched his father murdered right in front of him.

 _Screaming…_ _so much screaming and blood and fire and dust. And the child. Don't think about it. Stop._ If she closed her eyes she would live it again. She couldn't afford to do that yet, not when she was still in Iran – still in danger – and not when her emotions were balancing on a knife edge in danger of slipping and drawing fresh blood. She hated herself for actually _preferring_ the view from her window to the flashes of memory inside her head.

Bodies hanging at the end of coarse rope like low hanging fruit from a tree, swinging slightly in the breeze. Was it a breeze or was it the energy of the people storming the streets that was making them move? She didn't know, and nor would she, because the car picked up speed then, swerving to take a corner faster than seemed wise as her driver put his foot down on the accelerator.

The wheels of the car bumped roughly against the pavement to avoid a group with protest banners who had taken up residence in the middle of the road, a few harsh blares of the horn doing nothing to dispel them. It was then that Elizabeth noticed the fractious nature of the crowd starting to line the streets, some of them holding flares as they looked up at the men swinging from lampposts and other makeshift gallows, a shared energy seeming to thrum through them as their numbers swelled, _restless_. Below the dead the living made their stand, although what they stood for she couldn't immediately name. Elizabeth held herself still and quiet in her seat – as though that might make her invisible.

"Hold on, Madam Secretary. It's not too far now." Her driver sounded tense, his words simultaneously bitten out and rushed in a single breath as he struggled to navigate the unfamiliar territory without the usual contingent of DS agents to help back him up.

Elizabeth didn't know the driver very well; he hadn't been on her detail very long. One thing she did know, though.

It was not Fred's voice, providing her with updates.

Never again Fred's voice.

She blinked.

The car hit a pothole, jolting her and making the wound on her back burn, the skin no doubt splitting open again and her head pounding painfully, forcing her gaze away from the window and breaking her silent communion with the dead.

 _Home soon_.

Back to the living.

* * *

 _Elizabeth is OK. They found her. She's coming home._

Ever since Henry McCord had received the call to tell him that his wife was alive and on her way back to him, he had been repeating that fact to himself on a loop so it couldn't slip his mind even for a second. He'd do anything to forget those awful hours when he hadn't known where she was and anything could have happened, and his mind had done its best to make him think of all the horrible situations and worst case scenarios it could come up with.

Despite his best efforts to relax into his relief, he still couldn't shake the unease, which he knew wouldn't disappear until he saw Elizabeth walk through the door. Somehow when he had received the good news phone call, he had forgotten that DC from Tehran was at best the better part of a day's travel, and probably more given the somewhat fluid circumstances on the ground in Iran. To begin with no one had known when Elizabeth would be able to leave the country or how she'd be getting to the plane with half her detail dead or wounded; even after they had located her, information on the situation had remained patchy, which hadn't done anything for Henry's stress levels. It had taken him three calls to Nadine at the State Department to finally get an answer of when he could expect Elizabeth back, and he found himself wishing the time away because as far as he could see there was no point in these next hours before she arrived home.

There was nothing to be gained from the hours of waiting. He just wanted his wife back.

At least he was currently watching the version of Conrad Dalton's national address where Elizabeth had lived, and not the one Henry had for a time worried he'd have to give to announce her death on live television.

Henry sat slumped on one end of the sofa with his children next to him, Stevie's side pressed against his before Alison and then Jason at the other end of the seat, all of them lined up neatly in age order as they watched the President admit to the unauthorised involvement of US officials in the failed coup – and it was only then that Henry realised the problem that was about to detonate.

One of the problems, to be more precise. The problem that was not the coup or the betrayal or his wife missing while shots were being fired and she made the perfect target. No. This particular problem was more immediate and very close to home.

Henry sat up quickly in his seat when he realised what was coming – what he should have seen coming from the start of the address – but it was too late.

President Dalton paid tribute to the work of Secretary McCord behind the scenes in Tehran, and Stevie tensed up beside Henry as she realised the issue. Henry turned to look at his youngest child at the other end of the sofa, who was just hearing for the first time that his mother had been present during the coup, and who he really should have told before they sat down to watch this broadcast.

He took a shaky breath and prepared himself for the reaction from his sometimes wayward and volatile son.

When it came, it was uncharacteristically muted.

"Mom was in Iran?" Jason asked the question without looking away from the television screen, his eyes fixed to the President giving his national address.

Henry couldn't read his son's tone, and so he kept his own voice neutral when he answered, "Yeah."

He was aware of Stevie and Alison sitting still and tense next to Jason, both of them no doubt biting their tongues so they didn't admit that they knew where their mother had been and open themselves up to indignant anger from their brother.

Although maybe it would do him good to be angry, because right now he was just… quiet. It was unnerving, and impossible to read.

Henry could only let the silence go on for so long. "She's OK, buddy," he told his son with as much optimism as he could muster. "She's fine, she's on her way home. She'll be here in the morning."

He was aware he wasn't entirely convincing as he told Jason that Elizabeth was OK; while he had it on Nadine's reliable authority that his wife was indeed intact and on a plane on her way back to him, he hadn't actually spoken to her himself. And until he did, the fear would linger within him. Jason was old enough and smart enough to see it in him, too. Henry had no intention of telling his youngest about those awful hours when Elizabeth was missing, but he was obviously aware that something was wrong.

That didn't mean the kid would vocalise it though. "Good," Jason said, his expression neutral as he nodded once and stood abruptly. "Good night."

He left the room without looking at his father or his sisters, heading up the stairs to his bedroom.

Henry should have gone after him, on almost any other day would have gone after him. But not tonight. His head was still spinning with words and phrases like _coup_ and _Elizabeth is missing_ and _her detail may have been overrun_ and his veins were still humming with adrenaline. He wouldn't do Jason any good like this and, selfishly, he didn't want to have to be the steadfast dad, reassuring his child when he was hardly reassured himself. Not when he knew that Minister Javani was dead, and Elizabeth had been there when it happened, and the time between the minister being murdered and word getting through that Elizabeth was alive was mysteriously lacking in detail and there were still several hours unaccounted for.

Henry couldn't stop thinking about those hours.

He thought that Jason had the right idea, shutting himself away in his room to fall apart. Henry thought that sounded quite good right now. With any luck he'd be able to pull himself back together for when Elizabeth got home. He glanced over at his daughters, arm in arm and pressed close together, using each other for support as they watched the tail end of Conrad's speech. They'd be OK without him for a little while. Henry left the room without saying anything to them, and almost made it all the way to the bedroom before the first tear fell down his face.

* * *

Elizabeth was unsure how long she had been out of it when the voice of the captain came over the tannoy to tell his passengers that they were starting their decent into Andrews airbase. She had been sat stiff and still in her seat since they left the stopover at the medical base in Landstuhl, her mind in turn showing her a strangely detached replay of the terrible events of the past couple of days and spacing out completely. She felt numb.

She needed to snap back into it and tried to force herself to focus.

 _Flight time from Tehran to DC is at least thirteen hours with no stops. Add on the detour to Germany… how long were we there?_ She had felt every second of the first flight from Tehran to Landstuhl, the painkillers from the Iranian medical officer having long worn off and leaving her unable to focus on anything other than the persistent, sticky discomfort in her back. Her head had felt thick and heavy from the stress of it; she was aware that the wound on her back was bleeding through the bandage hastily applied in Iran and seeping out onto the seat. The wound felt hot and gritty…

… and so minor compared to what had happened to Fred and Javani, and she _had_ to stop thinking about it, stop feeling it. It didn't matter.

The local anaesthetic the army doctor had given her at Landstuhl had helped to stop her feeling it, mostly by making the area feel absent, curiously missing for a time. It had also made Elizabeth drowsy and her brain unwilling to cooperate, but she could still clearly smell the cleaning products that had been used to get rid of the blood when she finally got back to her plane seat.

Events were blurring into each other. She thought a crew member had brought her food – or had that been on the first flight? Either way, it had remained untouched and the next time she looked back down at the table by her seat, it had vanished without her realising. She remembered Frank from her detail coming to talk to her at one point, and she was aware of him sitting next to her for a while before he disappeared off to another part of the plane, but if she responded to him and what she might have said, she had no idea.

"Not long now, Madam Secretary."

It was almost like he knew she was thinking about him. The DS agent appeared in front of her and then slid into the seat to her right, buckling his seatbelt in preparation for landing. There was a cut on his hand and a small bandage at his throat, neither of which had been there on their outward journey to Iran.

Elizabeth turned to him with a sudden urgent thought on her mind and he looked at her expectantly, waiting. "Ma'am?" he prompted when she failed to voice her question.

She shook her head to clear it. The action didn't help but the dull throb of pain it inspired at her temple brought her a strange if welcome momentary clarity. Fred's body. She needed to know what had happened to the body, had to make sure he hadn't been left behind in Iran. If only she could find a way to get the question out. "Did I – Fred, I mean. Where is -?"

"We took care of Fred, Ma'am," Frank told her, quietly, sadly. "You called the embassy, remember?"

Yes, she remembered now. Remembered placing the call to the United States' embassy in Turkey, Iran's next door neighbour, once she had been able to finally – _finally_ \- get hold of a phone in the bunker in Tehran, telling the shocked woman who picked up the call that it was Secretary McCord speaking and she needed assistance, needed to get word to the President of the situation, needed to find the rest of her security detail to make sure they were OK, and needed safe passage out of the country for one patriotic security agent killed in the line of duty.

 _"_ _And you, Ma'am?" the woman at the embassy had asked._

 _"_ _Hmm?" Her mind replaying the sensation of Fred's dead body pressing her into the ground as gunfire rang out and the smell of something burning filled the room, Elizabeth hadn't quite registered the question._

 _"_ _And you need to get out, too?"_

 _Static filled the line for a long moment._

 _"_ _Oh… yes. Thank you." It had felt almost like an afterthought. Almost… undeserved, given that the last time she had seen Fred she was leaving his dead body behind in a burning building after he had given his life to save hers._

But she was out, and she was almost home.

The plane landed back on US soil with only the smallest of bumps. Elizabeth sat quietly in her seat as they taxied to a gradual stop, her ears blocked from the change in pressure, muffling the sounds of her security detail and cabin crew around her as they prepared to disembark. She stood as soon as the plane came to a stop, feeling the stab of pain in her back where the army doctor in Germany had given her a local anaesthetic and then carefully stitched her up, the numbing effects of the drug still in her system but their potency lessening. She hissed at the discomfort of it, making Frank turn around to look at her in concern. Her ears both popped at the same time when the cabin door opened and the noise of the cooling plane engine and the conversations around her kicked back in, and she was able to gather herself together enough to follow Frank down the steps and into the waiting car, where she sank back against the comfortable leather seat and for the first time allowed herself to think on the prospect of being reunited with her husband and children.

She thought about the night she had spent with Henry before she had left for Iran, how safe and loved and unbroken she had felt, and concentrating hard on the memories was just enough to get her through the car journey back to her house without thinking about what had happened after that night. That was good. She didn't want the children to read what had happened on her face, although she wasn't foolish enough to think that they wouldn't already know.

Still. She could still be a good mother and pretend for them.

Stepping through the door of her house felt momentarily like the ordinary end of an ordinary long day. But then she saw Henry coming towards her with an urgency that was reserved only for emergencies and acute distress, and the brief illusion shattered and she was back in the current awful reality, and the feel of her husband's arms around her was the only thing helping her keep it together.

Her children hugged her next.

They were warm and brilliant and _alive_ and when she closed her eyes and pressed her face into Jason's neck all she could see was the face of little Abdol as he watched his father die of a bullet wound and she was in two places at once and so _glad_ that she was back and her children wouldn't have to know that pain of losing her and so guilty at the same time that someone else's child already did.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Henry had hung back a little bit while the kids reunited with Elizabeth. They needed their mother, and it would be wrong for him to distract her attention away from them, especially their daughters who had been there for every moment of worry while she was missing.

But he itched to hold his wife, wanted nothing more than to whisk her away upstairs to their room where they could be alone and neither of them would have to put on a show to pretend that everything was fine.

He watched as Elizabeth hugged Jason, a haunted look on her face that none of the kids could see from where they were standing, but Henry had a clear view. She blinked, and Henry wasn't entirely sure what it was that she was seeing. She shifted her grip on her son, one sleeve of her sweater riding up slightly.

There was a bandage on her arm.

Henry had only received bits and pieces of information from the people he had spoken to – Nadine and Russell and the DS agents stationed outside the house – but he'd collected enough details and pieced together enough to confirm that Elizabeth had been present in the room when Javani was killed, and that Fred Cole had died while protecting her from the bullets that had taken the life of her Iranian friend.

It had been that close, she had been that close to dying - and now she had a bandage on her arm. Elizabeth pulled back from Jason to hold his shoulders while she pressed a kiss to his forehead and Henry was pretty sure she winced as she reached one hand back to adjust the way her sweater lay against her side.

No one had said that she was hurt. He had been told that she'd been looked at by a medical officer once in Iran and again in Germany and that she was fine, but no one had mentioned any injuries. _Protocol,_ Nadine had called the stopover at Landstuhl when she had mentioned it almost casually to Henry on the phone. _A precaution._

Concern thrummed through him.

Elizabeth's sweater fell back into place as her arms dropped from Jason, hiding the edge of the bandage from view. She turned to Alison, her voice urgent and apologetic as she said, "I'm _so_ sorry I missed your birthday, Noodle."

Alison rolled her eyes. "Mom, it's fine, don't worry. We can celebrate now you're home." Her smile was just a little bit too bright, too eager.

"It's _not_ fine," Elizabeth protested. She seemed for a moment like she might be about to say something else but then she stopped, no doubt deciding that it was no use pushing the point when it wouldn't change anything, and Alison was being so wonderfully understanding about the whole thing.

Their middle child carried on brightly as though she was trying to force normalcy onto things. "Did you eat on the plane?" she asked, but didn't wait for a response. "I think we should have brunch. As a family. I'll make something nice and quick."

"You already had breakfast," Stevie said, nudging her sister and joining in with the slightly forced jollity.

"So?" Alison turned and headed for the kitchen, followed by her brother and sister, the three of them bickering lightly about the merits of savoury versus sweet when it came to the ideal menu for brunch.

Henry reached out and gently took Elizabeth's hand. She watched the backs of their kids disappear into the kitchen before she turned to face him, her fingers wrapping around his and flexing rhythmically in what Henry took to be a nervous twitch. He lifted his other hand to stroke the hair back from her face, tucking it carefully behind her ear and letting his fingers linger against her cheek, noting the slight dryness of her skin and the unfamiliar feel of light dust against his fingertips. No doubt she hadn't had time to stop for a proper shower since everything went wrong. It reminded him that though she was home, it wasn't completely over yet. _She could have died._ That was something that was going to linger. Henry cupped her face with his hand. "Hey," he said, quietly, reverently.

She gave him a small, tremulous smile. "Hi."

He sensed that she wasn't entirely with him, that part of her was still stuck in the memories of whatever had happened in Iran, and he was overcome again with the urge to take her away from everything and shut the door on the world for a while. He tilted his head towards the kitchen. "You OK to do this?"

She hesitated for a moment but her answer when it came was strong and confident. "Yes, definitely."

Henry nodded. "OK."

He pressed a lingering kiss to her temple and then led her by the hand to the kitchen, where Jason was standing over a pan of bacon, Alison was whisking eggs and Stevie was making a mountain of toast. Henry's stomach rumbled as the smell of cooking food reached him; he'd skipped his own breakfast that morning, too tightly wound to eat anything before Elizabeth arrived home.

"Looks good, guys," he said to the kids.

Alison tipped the eggs into a pan. They hissed as they came into contact with the heat. "Thanks, Dad."

The three of them kept up a steady stream of chatter while they cooked that was only occasionally slightly forced and that very carefully avoided mentioning the topic of the coup in Iran. Henry stayed quiet, standing next to Elizabeth and watching her discreetly out of the corner of his eye. She was listening to the kids and putting in a comment from time to time, but Henry could feel the tension radiating from her. She held herself a little awkwardly too, leaning into both him and the kitchen island in front of her like she needed the support of both of them to keep her upright. She seemed a little woozy. Henry guessed that she was sleep-deprived and probably had a belter of a headache from the stress and the noise of the gunshots and explosions.

And one hand kept drifting round to adjust her sweater against her back.

When the food was nearly done, he ushered her into a seat at the table and poured glasses of juice for them all while the kids plated up and brought the food over. Henry would normally have made a quip about them cooking for their parents – the lifecycle of care complete, their job of raising the children done – but he was aware that his children needed to feel like they were doing something, needed to contribute and try and force things back to normal, so he said nothing but _thank you_ when Stevie placed a heaping plate down in front of him.

He turned his attention to the food then, his stomach eager to be fed, and it was only when he had cleared his plate and was working on a second helping of toast and bacon that he realised Elizabeth was pushing her food around on the plate, picking at it occasionally but mostly just looking off into the middle distance, blinking heavily like she was resisting the urge to sleep.

Henry swallowed his last mouthful and then reached out to cover Elizabeth's hand with his, stilling the aimless movement of her fork around the plate. "Babe?" he questioned, aware that he sounded concerned and that the kids were watching curiously.

Elizabeth looked at him and in the bright light of the kitchen, the fatigue on her face was unmissable. No doubt the kids would see it too. "Yeah," she responded.

He slid his fingers around hers as he stood up, tugging on her hand lightly. "Come on," he said. Enough now. She had done what she needed to do for her children, given them time as a family to regroup. Henry knew that the three of them were all still processing, but they were doing well. They could prop each other up for a bit while he took care of his wife and reassured himself that everything was OK.

"Mom?" Ali said worriedly as Elizabeth slowly stood to join Henry, a little unsteady on her feet.

"It's OK, Noodle, I've got her." Henry gave his middle child a soft smile as he ushered Elizabeth in front of him with a gentle hand on her shoulder.

There was the quiet sound of the kids finishing off their food and talking in hushed tones as Henry guided Elizabeth up the stairs and then there was silence as they entered their bedroom. Henry closed the door behind them before resting his hands lightly on Elizabeth's hips, encouraging her to step the rest of the way into him.

She came to him with a sigh, resting her cheek against his shoulder and her arms sliding loosely around his waist, letting her weight fall onto him. Henry slipped one arm around her shoulders and rested his other hand at the base of her spine, mindful of the discomfort she seemed to be experiencing. He wanted to hold her tight, to pull her firmly into him and not let go, but he still didn't know how she had been hurt.

Just having her in his arms was enough for now.

* * *

Feeling Henry surrounding her was helping, bringing her back to herself despite the tension still rattling through her with every breath. She felt more grounded in Henry's solid embrace, what happened in Iran still playing on her mind but now in the more normal form of memories rather than as something lived and re-lived and lived again even though it had been over for more than twenty four hours.

Elizabeth turned her head to press a kiss to Henry's throat, the only bit of his skin she could reach without having to dislodge the secure circle of his arms. He hummed in response and turned his own head to drop kisses onto her hair, the palm on her back softly stroking in small circles and keeping her body pressed up against his. She felt comfortable and safe for the first time since she had left for Iran, and the renewed feeling of security was bringing her exhaustion to the surface. She was unable to stop the yawn that escaped.

"You should get some sleep, babe," Henry murmured, sounding every bit as drained and tired as she felt.

He was right, she should sleep, and so should he. But not just yet. Not when she still wore the dust of the explosion on her skin and in her hair, and not when she still felt so tainted by the things that she had seen, so much death up close, surrounding her, on top of her, lining the streets, _everywhere_. Abdol crying for his father. She blinked in an effort to push the image of the crying boy to the back of her mind and hoped that the remembered distress wouldn't show too obviously on her face. "No, shower first," she said to Henry. "I need to shower."

Henry pulled back slightly to look at her and for a moment Elizabeth thought he was going to argue against her, but after a pass of his gaze over her face, he just nodded. "OK, sure." He cupped her face and pressed a soft, lingering kiss to her lips, his thumbs stroking her cheeks gently. "I'll start the water running for you."

She stood in the centre of their bedroom to watch him go for a moment before turning herself to the task of undressing. She had kicked off her shoes and rid herself of her jacket downstairs, and even removing those garments had caused flickers of discomfort in her exhausted body. Elizabeth carefully slid one arm and then the other out of the sleeves of her sweater, one of her bandages catching on the knitted fabric and making her wince as it pulled at the small wound. She managed to get the sweater over her head without too much trouble, but then for no reason at all she lost her sense of purpose and just stood there holding it in one hand and staring at the wall until Henry came back in from the bathroom a minute later.

"The water should be warm now if you want to… Elizabeth?" He stopped a few feet away from her, taking her in.

Elizabeth was aware that his gaze had found the bandages on her lower arms that hid the cuts caused by glass and debris from the explosion, and from the way his expression darkened at the sight of them she was glad that the wound on her back was still hidden beneath her camisole. Then Henry's gaze shifted up slightly.

He took a step towards her and when he spoke his voice was soft and worried and hollow. "Honey?"

She wasn't sure what he was looking at and so she cast a glance down at herself to find bruises on both of her biceps that she hadn't been aware of, one side darker and more pronounced than the other. Bruises that Henry reached out gingerly to touch, lining his fingers up against the darkening templates left by someone else's hand. "Oh," Elizabeth said.

Henry's breath hitched and he dipped his head to catch her gaze, his fingers stroking over her arm. He opened his mouth to ask the question but no sound came out.

Elizabeth thought about how to explain. "The security guys…" she started. Her voice felt raw and scratchy. She swallowed. She remembered Fred Cole on top of her, the dead weight of him starting to become apparent as the gunfire tapered off and the dust began to settle and she could see out of the corner of her eye flames starting to dance along the wall as Javani's home was set alight, his son still crying a few feet away from where Elizabeth lay. Her ears had been ringing and her head had been pounding, and she had felt anxiety welling up inside her and drowning out the adrenaline until all she could feel was the panic.

Panic that had only grown when she heard men shouting in Arabic and footsteps running towards her. The footsteps had paused just outside the door and then there had been more shouting and more gunshots – so close this time, close enough for her to hear the ricochet – and then the footsteps restarted, coming closer and closer until she could see the feet of the men they belonged to.

She had struggled to try and get out from under the weight of Fred, instinct telling her that if this was it, that if this was the perpetrators of the coup come to kill her or capture her, she wasn't about to take it lying down.

Then she had heard someone cursing under their breath in Arabic, swearing at the destruction that they found and _oh, the minister is dead_ , and she knew that they had seen Javani but they didn't sound as though they were pleased about the death like she would expect the coup leaders to be. Then the swearing man had turned to look down at her.

The light pressure of Henry's hands on her arms brought her back to where she stood with him in their bedroom. "Javani's security team came in a few minutes after the explosion," she said. "They lifted me up and got me out of there. I don't think my feet even touched the ground. That's how…" She nodded to the finger-shaped bruises on her arms.

 _Still struggling to crawl out from beneath the dead DS agent without jostling his body too much, Elizabeth barely noticed the hands reaching out to lift him away and help her to stand. It was only when those hands had set her upright and instilled a firm grip on her biceps – one person on either side of her – ready to get her out of the house that she realised what had happened._

 _She had fought the men on instinct for a moment as her panic surged, recognising neither of them and still not entirely sure whether they were friend or foe. Then her lungs had filled with the smoke that was starting to engulf the house, making her cough and diverting all of her attention to drawing breath, stilling her fight and allowing the men to shoulder her between them and head for the door while she coughed against the smoke. She could hear the fire as she was hustled out of the house and towards a waiting car that was not her own._

 _But in the next car along was Abdol reuniting with his mother and the rest of Javani's family, and with them preparing to depart was a security guy that Elizabeth vaguely recognised, who raised his hand to acknowledge her and the men escorting her. With no other palatable options, Elizabeth concluded that they must be safe._

 _She turned to the swearing man as they reached the car and they let her go for her to climb inside. "Fred," she said, frantic. She was aware that she was crying. "My security agent, he's – We can't leave him!" She turned back towards the house, to the doorway that was haloed by acrid grey smoke and flames flickering orange and blue._

 _The man stepped into her to move her back towards the car. "We won't," he said. "Look."_

 _He pointed back at the house where a team of about six black-clad security officers had assembled by the entrance. Elizabeth watched as they disappeared into the flames._

 _"_ _We will retrieve him and the minister, Madam Secretary. But now you must go." His words were quiet but insistent, and when Elizabeth wavered for a moment he didn't hesitate to grip her arm again and bodily force her into the car, following her in and slamming the door as they took off for a destination unknown._

 _It was only once they were on the move that Elizabeth realised she had no idea where the rest of her security detail were. Which meant they didn't know where she was, either. Oh God._

 _"_ _I need to contact my government."_

* * *

Henry struggled to keep his face composed as Elizabeth gave him what he took to be an edited version of events surrounding the explosion and how she came to acquire the marks on her body. He could see her retreating into her own mind in the pauses between her fragmented sentences, and wanted to prompt her, to push her to tell him everything, but was aware that it probably wasn't quite the time.

She broke off after telling him that Iranian security forces had gone in to retrieve Fred's body while she was whisked away in a car by strangers, hoping that she'd put her trust in the right place. Henry kissed her, cradling her jaw in one hand and trailing his other hand down her arm to tangle their fingers together. He broke the kiss after a minute and leant his forehead against hers, just breathing her in. Her hair smelled faintly of smoke.

He thought about the explosion that had occurred, about Elizabeth trapped under the weight of her security agent, aware that he was dead, not knowing where the rest of her security detail was, the dead body of her friend almost within touching distance, the knowledge that his house had been targeted, not knowing if the perpetrators were going to come and find her and what they might do if they did… Henry's face crumpled and he knew that Elizabeth would have heard the way his breath caught in his chest. _She almost died._ It was all he could think.

"Hey, Henry," Elizabeth said. "It's OK, I'm OK."

Both of those statements were lies, he knew that, but she delivered them convincingly and he thought that she was trying to reassure herself as much as him so he let her have it. He squeezed her hand. "Let's get you in the shower."

She followed him into the warm, steam-filled bathroom – a little warily, he thought – and let him remove her trousers but then hesitated when he reached for the hem of her camisole.

"Babe?" Henry stilled his movements and watched her face closely, but found he was unable to get a read on her. "Elizabeth, it's just me," he said softly.

He watched her turn that over as she looked up at him, considering. "It's just…" she started. She blinked a couple of times and then reached down and pulled the top off herself.

Henry realised then why she had hesitated.

* * *

 **Thanks so much for reading! More soon. I'd love to know what you think :)**


	3. Chapter 3

Thanks to everyone for reading, and for the lovely comments. I hope you enjoy this final chapter :)

 **Chapter Three**

Blood, at some point, had seeped through the bandage on her back and had since dried, colouring the otherwise white fabric with small spots of deep rusty reddish-brown.

Elizabeth stood in front of Henry, looking up at his face while he looked at the reflection of her injury in the mirror behind them for a long minute, before he reached up with one hand to trace his fingers lightly around the bandage, watching his own actions as he did. He swallowed heavily.

"It's not that bad," Elizabeth murmured, her words almost lost under the sound of the running water from the shower.

Needing a closer look before deciding whether to believe her assertion, Henry gently turned her around and then crouched down behind her, smoothing his hands over waist to steady her. The area around the bandage was slightly bruised and swollen and was no doubt tender to the touch. He had to bite his tongue to stop himself from disagreeing with Elizabeth. Rationally, logically, the injury was obviously not that bad compared to what might have been. She was still standing and coherent and her waist beneath Henry's hands was soft and unblemished, if a little streaked with superficial dust and grime. But the wound was clearly bothering her, causing her pain, and the fact the surrounding area was bruised and she had bled through the bandage suggested that it wasn't entirely nothing, either. He stopped himself from saying any of that, instead lightly touching the edge of the bandage and saying, "Can you take this off to shower?"

He glanced up to see her face in the mirror. She nodded. "There are… extra dressings in my suitcase."

Henry carefully picked at one of the edges of tape that held the gauze to Elizabeth's skin, gently working it loose before peeling back the bulk of the dressing. He was so intent on removing it without hurting her further that it was only when he pulled the gauze free of her back that he saw the wound it had been hiding. "Babe," he whispered.

It looked to be the result of debris or shrapnel – something sharp, something sharp enough to tear through her flesh, and fast enough and with enough impact that it left bruising in its wake, too. The stitches holding her skin together were expertly done, small and neat but all too fresh, still raw and vivid against her skin, no doubt tugging uncomfortably with every movement. There was no doubt it was going to scar.

Henry stood, reaching around Elizabeth to drop the slightly-bloody gauze on the countertop before standing behind her, fingertips resting on her hips. He looked at their reflections in the mirror to find her watching him closely, gauging his reaction, her face carefully impassive to avoid revealing anything until he delivered his verdict. As far as he was concerned, there was only one response. Henry dropped his head and pressed a lingering, desperate kiss to her throat. "I love you," he said, hands sliding around to her abdomen, gently pulling her back towards him, wanting her close, to feel her pulse beating healthily against him.

She lifted one hand to stroke his hair, still watching him in the mirror; he could feel her eyes on him even as he buried his face in her neck, not knowing how to express how grateful he was that she was home and mostly OK other than by clinging to her in something approaching desperation.

"I love you, too," Elizabeth said. She tugged lightly the short hairs at the base of his neck to make him lift his head. "I need to shower."

He could feel the urgency in her movement and he knew that she had to be desperate to get clean after the heat of Iran and the explosion and the blood and the travelling, all of it clinging to her skin – and beneath her skin. Of course she wanted to wash it off. He loosened his hold on her and nodded, watching as she pulled off the bandages that were covering the smaller injuries on both her arms, being not nearly as careful as he had been as she tugged at the tape and gauze. Henry winced in sympathy but Elizabeth didn't flinch. He supposed that ripping off a plaster didn't really compare to the pain of what had caused the injury in the first place.

She looked down, dropping her gaze from his in the mirror and looking at the countertop instead, appearing suddenly nervous and unsure.

Henry ran a gentle hand down her arm in encouragement.

"Will you stay with me?" she asked, like it was a question that actually needed to be asked, like he wouldn't be there no matter what, always.

He was a little surprised, though, thinking that she would have wanted at least a few minutes alone. He wasn't unaware that his wife hadn't yet told him everything that had happened in Iran, and he had thought she might have wanted some time by herself to process and deal with it in her own way without him there to probe her with questions she wasn't ready to answer. Failing that, he had thought that maybe she'd want to be able to break down and cry without anyone to witness it. It worried him a little that she showed no signs of wanting that; she was clearly exhausted and distressed and not herself, but Henry could already sense her starting to stitch her fragile emotional state back together like the doctors had stitched her skin, pulling herself together before she was ready, before she had properly dealt with everything. Because that was what she did: she carried on.

He realised that he hadn't answered her question and that Elizabeth had once more raised her eyes to look at him in the mirror. "Henry, I'm sorry," she said when he realised she was watching him. Her voice was soft and held a genuine apology.

"For what?" His voice cracked slightly and it seemed at least one of them would be crying in the shower in a minute.

She considered the question for a moment before answering. "For making your face look like that."

"Like what?" He genuinely wanted to know; he wasn't sure what name he'd put to it, but if his expression was anything like the emotions he was feeling, no doubt he looked a mess.

"Like… sad."

* * *

Elizabeth had thought that Henry might attempt a smile for her at her words, to try and prove that he was fine.

He didn't.

Instead, he turned her urgently to him with his hands on her hips, lifted one hand to thread it into her hair, and kissed her.

She could feel in his kiss everything he wanted to say but couldn't quite put into words, the worry and anguish and relief he was feeling, and the need for affirmation, to reconnect and find again their solid ground. She gave as good as she got, pushing back against him and wrapping her arms around his shoulders, letting the solidity of him anchor her. The stress and sorrow and anger bubbled low in her gut, still present, but kept at bay by the security offered by her husband. Then her stomach brushed against his, the fabric of his shirt against her bare skin, innocent and intimate, and without thinking she pulled back, tearing her mouth from his and gasping in a breath.

She shouldn't be giving him this burden. It had been her decision to go to Iran. She knew Henry hadn't wanted her to, and he had been right, but she had gone, because she had to. And look what had happened. Bodies were hanging in the streets. Fred had died because of her. She had worn his blood on her skin all the way to Landstuhl where a nurse had cleaned her up, sympathy in her eyes that Elizabeth hadn't been able to look at without feeling shame. And Abdol… She couldn't tell Henry about Abdol. She couldn't tell anyone.

How would she even start to put it into words? Properly express the culpability she felt.

No. Henry didn't need that.

But he did need an explanation, because he was standing with his hands lightly on her shoulders like he wasn't sure if he should be touching her, and his face was struggling not to collapse into full-blown worry and guilt, like he thought he'd done something wrong. "Babe?" he prompted, when she failed to say anything to explain why she had pulled away from him.

Then again, it was _Henry_ , and he understood her better than anyone. She stared at him, dropping any attempt to conceal her emotions, and just let him look at her face for a few moments, just until he understood.

Understood that right now, she just didn't _know_. Everything was upside down.

She clung tightly to his arms, willing him to understand that she didn't want him to pull back from her even though she had just pulled back from him.

His face softened and he gave her a tender smile. "Come on," he said, sliding one hand down her arm and around to her shoulder blade, applying gentle pressure to direct her towards the shower.

"I'm so tired," she found herself saying without realising she was going to do so, the unprompted words seeming to cover a multitude of sins.

Henry's thumb rubbed across her skin. "I know. It's OK."

Thank God. He got it.

Elizabeth pulled off the rest of her clothes and stepped under the stream of running water, feeling the sting of it against her minor abrasions and the way it felt like hot knives against the stitched-up slash on her back. Curiously, she welcomed it, turning her face up into the spray and letting it wash over her, aware that the remains of blood and dust and grime would be pooling in the shallow tray and then swirling down the drain, diluted by the water until they were barely even noticeable, dispersed and vanished.

She knew that. But they were still there, just beneath the surface of her skin.

A hand touched her hip and she turned to find Henry just behind her, water sluicing down his body as he stood with her beneath the spray.

How come the water washed him clean when she still felt so tainted?

* * *

The water around their feet gradually turned clear, the soluble remnants of Elizabeth's trip to Iran washed away down the drain. Henry used a washcloth to wipe away a stubborn bit of dried blood from her arm, and that was the last of it. It made him feel like a weight was lifting, even as she stood before him with cuts and bruises and her face hollow and exhausted: it felt cathartic, like healing.

It bolstered him, even as his concern lingered.

Henry stood in the shower with her while she washed her hair, resisting the urge to step in and take over when it was clear it was paining her to reach up for prolonged periods. He knew that she needed the control, the expression on her face when she had looked at him just before getting in the shower telling him that she felt off-kilter, out of control, and she needed it back. However small the action was, and however much he ached to step in and take care of her.

Once she had finished, Elizabeth stepped into him and wrapped her arms around his waist, squeezing firmly as she laid her head against his shoulder. Henry gladly returned the embrace, slightly unsure if she was actively seeking comfort or if it was the manifestation of her exhaustion taking over. Either way, he welcomed the contact after days of worry and empty arms, and it was several minutes before he was able to bring himself to draw one arm away from her so he could reach out and switch off the running water.

He shivered as the cool air hit, goosebumps forming on his skin and Elizabeth's, although she appeared not to notice the chill when the water stopped and Henry reached out to draw back the shower curtain, letting out the steam and replacing it with the cooler air of the bathroom.

Having something to do helped him, even if it was just reaching out to grab a towel off the rail so he could wrap it around Elizabeth, before reaching back to get one for himself. Next he manoeuvred them out of the shower and into the bedroom, where he sat Elizabeth down on the edge of the bed, water still clinging to her skin and dripping from her hair. The abrasions on her arms and her assorted bruises stood out vividly against her skin and the white of the towel now that she was washed clean.

She seemed to be lost in her thoughts as he stepped away, hardly noticing as he quickly dried himself off and stepped into sweatpants and pulled on a t-shirt before leaving her alone in their bedroom for a minute so he could run downstairs and retrieve her suitcase – and the fresh dressings - from the car where she had left it in the care of her DS agents.

Her depleted, wounded DS agents who had been with her in the line of fire.

In the morning he would offer them his commiserations over Fred and linger for a while to speak with those who remained, but for the time being he simply extracted the suitcase from the back of the car without meeting anyone's eye and gave them a guilty, grateful smile as he headed back inside to his wife.

One day he'd find a way to repay them for what they did to save her life.

* * *

Elizabeth could smell the smoke coming closer.

She was trapped under Fred's body and she couldn't get out, but the smoke was closing in, gathering around her in a shroud, and the flames were licking at the edges of her vision. And little Abdol was screaming.

The weight, the smoke, the panic, the noise… she couldn't breathe.

Hands touched her shoulders and she jumped, startled, her eyes flashing open to find Henry's face directly before her as he crouched down in front of where she sat on the edge of the bed – home, safe, where nothing was burning and the only screams to be heard were the memories in her head. But the breaths still struggled to come.

"Hey, Elizabeth, it's OK." Henry's warm, broad palms stroked over her shoulders, solid and real, encouraging her back to him. "It's OK, look at me." His head dipped to catch her gaze and make sure she complied. "You're all right. Just breathe."

She did as she was told, her husband's calm, steady voice helping to reassure her and re-establish her connection with reality. Reality, where she had things to accomplish, work to do. She couldn't afford to lose herself to visions of dead men and a screaming child in front of a backdrop of dust and flames. She needed to be present. She needed to build a barrier between herself and what had happened so that she could focus on her work.

The only trouble was she wasn't quite sure how to do that.

Instead she just focused on Henry, letting him soothe her, watching as his face gradually leeched itself of fraught worry and was replaced instead by the soft, loving smile she was so used to seeing on his features. It helped. He helped. "Sorry," she said.

He shook his head. "No need, babe. It's gonna take time."

She didn't have time. She couldn't afford to waste any time on her own demons when there was so much else to do, and not when she was still breathing and Fred and Javani were not. But she couldn't say that to Henry, because she knew he wouldn't agree. Instead, she said, "I know."

Not technically a lie.

"I got your suitcase," Henry said as he stood up, holding his hand out to her and encouraging her to join him.

She let him help pull her to her feet and gave him a smile. A tiny part of her wanted to protest at his close attentiveness, at how almost clingy he was being, but she knew that he needed the connection. He must have been so worried. She could read it on him, in every look and action. She had put that worry there, deep within him, and so if he needed to fuss over her to make himself feel a bit better, she'd let him.

It made her feel a bit better too, she realised. Being able to do something for him - even if it was just standing still in front of him while he wrapped fresh bandages around the cuts on her arms and taped a fresh piece of cushioned gauze to her back before pulling one of his own t-shirts over her head - made her feel more in control. It made her feel useful, to be able to help him so easily. It made her want to do more. She raised one hand to cup his cheek, feeling the slight tremor in her own arm as she forced her tired muscles to cooperate. "Henry, you can talk about it, you know. You can talk to me." She didn't want him to bottle anything up just because she was feeling on edge.

He turned his head and kissed her palm. "I know. And I will." He slid his arms around her, letting his forehead drop to her shoulder. "But after we sleep."

Elizabeth held his head against her, stroking his hair and breathing deeply – breathing deeply for the first time since leaving Henry and the kids to go to Iran. It made her think that maybe everything would be OK. Eventually. After some time. Elizabeth McCord didn't break, not for anything.

At the very least she thought that she would be able to put on a brave enough face to make it through work the next day without anyone suspecting the turmoil going on inside her head.

She kissed the top of Henry's head. "Henry, if you want to sleep, we've got to get in bed."

He released a long, hot breath against her. "I'm comfy here."

She smiled. "You'll be comfier if we're in bed."

He squeezed her gently. "Yeah."

Henry let her go and moved to close the curtains while Elizabeth climbed – finally – into bed. It was light outside, somewhere close to lunchtime, but she didn't care. She hadn't slept in almost two days, and she'd confidently bet from the look of him that Henry was the same.

He slid into bed beside her and turned on his side to look at her, one hand reaching out to slide across her stomach, his face close enough to hers that she could feel his breath on her cheek. "I'm so glad you're home," he said, his voice already heavy and drowsy as he let go of the tension he'd been feeling and let himself fall gratefully towards sleep.

She wrapped her hand around his on her stomach, enjoying the feel of his fingers curling firmly around hers. "Me too. Thank you for being amazing."

His nose nuzzled her hair and his lips pressed briefly against her temple before his head dropped back to the pillow. "Thank you for coming home to me."

Her heart ached as she remembered how she almost hadn't.

Henry fell quiet then and Elizabeth listened as his breaths evened out and he succumbed to sleep. She wanted desperately to join him. Her eyes felt gritty and her eyelids were heavy and drawn together like magnets, but still she couldn't seem to keep them closed for longer than a couple of seconds at a time. She was so tired she felt nauseated. She had to sleep.

She had to sleep because when she woke up, she would have to go to work, and once she got to work there would be no room for tiredness. She needed to get to the bottom of what was going on, deal with the aftermath of the coup attempt, and somehow try and atone for Fred and Javani and Abdol. She couldn't do that unless she slept.

Yet for some reason, sleep wouldn't come. Instead she stared at the ceiling, her thoughts unable to settle, her hand wrapped around Henry's, clinging on to him for purchase as he rested peacefully next to her.

Outside the sun was shining. She heard the sound of a car engine revving from the other side of the street and then the vehicle pulled away, casting moving shadows over the ceiling as it disappeared down the road. Her stomach lurched and her head swam as she watched them. With the car gone, the shadow on the ceiling changed to that of the lamppost outside the house, some trick of the light casting the perfect impression of it across the blank canvas of her bedroom ceiling, bringing with it the shadow of a memory of a makeshift gallows on the streets of Tehran. The bleak reminder captivated her.

If she looked at that shadow too long, she thought that she saw a body hanging there, tethered by rope and swinging slightly in the breeze. Elizabeth lay below the dead, unblinking, reliving that last drive through the streets of Tehran, weighed down by the guilt and mess of emotions coursing through her. She couldn't look away. She held her breath.

Beside her, Henry shifted in his sleep, reminding her of what was real. Elizabeth let out a long breath and blinked to clear her vision.

There was no body hanging from her bedroom ceiling, and the shadows there were only shadows. She was _fine._ She forced her eyes to close, willing herself to believe it.

Finally – _finally_ \- unconsciousness beckoned.

She took the memories with her to sleep.


End file.
